CLASSIC: History's Weirdest Flexes, Part Two

Summary

Ridiculous History — “CLASSIC: History’s Weirdest Flexes, Part Two”

Hosts: Ben Bowlin & Noel Brown
Guests: Jack O’Brien & Miles Gray (The Daily Zeitgeist)
Date: May 30, 2026
Podcast: iHeartPodcasts

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Episode Overview

The second part of "History’s Weirdest Flexes" delves deeper into some of history’s most jaw-dropping acts of unnecessary ostentation, privilege, and cruelty—aka “weird flexes.” Hosts Ben and Noel, joined by Jack and Miles from The Daily Zeitgeist, explore mind-boggling historical displays of wealth, power, and status, as well as their dark social implications. The tone bounces between irreverent banter and sharp social commentary, as the group dissects everything from sugary sculptures to Victorian mummy-unwrappings.

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Key Discussion Points & Timestamps

1. Opening Banter and Setup

(03:09 – 04:17)

• The crew reconvenes for part two, referencing prior tales (like Darwin eating rare tortoises) and joking about podcast logistics and Robert Evans’s fierce Mountain Dew loyalty.

Jack: "If we touch his Mountain Dew, we are in... we will actually be in harm's way." (04:36)

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2. Sugar Subtleties: History’s Sweetest Flex

(06:00 – 13:38)

Sugar as Status Symbol (16th–17th century England)

• In the 1600s, piles and sculptures of sugar ("subtleties") were displays of immense wealth, as sugar was extremely expensive.
• These artful sugar works evolved from showy heaps to elaborate sculptures—animals, castles, or satirical symbols.
• Subtleties served both as edible art and social commentary at feasts of the elites (kings, nobles, clergy).

Noel: "They were called subtleties. And they're not subtle at all, right?... A flex isn't meant to be subtle." (06:42)

• The name "subtleties" is called out as sarcastic, given the extravagant intent.

Kara Walker’s Modern Callback

• Noel spotlights Kara Walker’s 2014 Brooklyn installation "A Subtlety," a 35-foot-tall sugar sphinx referencing both the tradition of sugar flexes and the history of sugar production’s ties to slavery and racism.

Noel: “It was a giant sphinx that was 35ft tall... with the face akin to the mammie kind of trope.” (10:33)

• Discussion highlights how these indulgences were predicated on exploitation, specifically slave labor.

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3. Sugar Flex Ratings & Modern Parallels

(11:27 – 19:46)

• Jack, unimpressed by “just a pile of a thing,” rates the original sugar flex a “5 out of 10.” (12:14)
• The group riffs on whether the ironic naming ("subtleties") is the real flex.
• The conversation takes a turn into culinary showmanship, like a sugar stag that bleeds wine or castles that shoot edible artillery—definitely “leveling up” the flex.
• Rating gets boosted: "The cannon firing sugar out. That's an eight. That's an eight for sure." — Jack (18:12)

Connections to Modern Life

• Miles points out that today, “giant rich kid birthday party cakes” are the new subtleties—a status competition among parents, now with cakes instead of sugar sculptures.

Miles: “We're still creating subtleties. They're just giant rich kid birthday party cakes, I guess.” (19:39)

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4. Ultimate Colonial Flex: Victorian Mummy Unwrappings

(20:22 – 26:38)

Mummy Dismemberment as Social Event

• Miles details how Victorians, obsessed with Egypt (Egyptomania), attended live “mummy unwrappings.”
• Surgeon Thomas Pettigrew popularized mummy-unwrapping as a hybrid of science, spectacle, and status—a ticketed event.
• In France, similar events were even more performative, making mummies “dance” as their wrappings were removed.

Jack: “He wasn't the first person to unroll a mummy... but he was the guy who kind of mainstreamed it as being like a performance.” (21:49)

Disturbing Underpinnings: Racism and Appropriation

• Pettigrew’s pseudoscientific goals included “proving” Egyptians were Caucasian through phrenology.
• "Appropriating someone in death for your own death": The Duke of Hamilton’s dying wish was to be mummified and placed in an ancient sarcophagus—booting an actual Egyptian body for his own entombment.

Jack: “Let me kick this ancient body out... now let me appropriate, mummify me and put me in the sarcophagus.” (24:21)

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5. Reflecting on the Flex & Cruelty Scales

(26:12 – 26:38)

• Ben and Noel rate the mummy-related flexes as the most extreme, ranking them a "10" for cruelty, given not just the spectacle but the deep colonialist disrespect.
• The group proposes two scales: “weird flex” and “cruelty,” as many historical flexes were built on suffering.

Noel: "You're just using it for the amusement of the public... We should have two scales. The weird flex scale and the cruelty scale." (26:12)

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6. History’s Flexes: Then & Now

(30:29 – 33:48)

How Far Have We Come?

• The hosts compare these historical "flexes" to today's status displays—social media unboxing videos, splashy parties, and modern-day hoarding of rare objects (e.g., Nick Cage’s T. Rex skull).
• Miles notes that, despite greater awareness today, ostentatious and sometimes ethically murky displays of wealth still exist in new forms.

Miles: “We also have unboxing videos.” (31:23)

Historical Bummers & Funeral Note

• There’s a rueful reflection on how nearly every story’s core involved cruelty, exploitation, or privilege.
• But the group finds camaraderie and humor in unpacking the absurdity and terribleness of history—while vowing to invent some less-horrifying future flexes.

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Notable Quotes

• Jack: “No, just a pile of a thing... I’ll give it a solid five on the flex chart.” (12:14)
• Miles: “We’re still creating subtleties. They’re just giant rich kid birthday party cakes, I guess.” (19:39)
• Noel: “Commodifying and appropriating a sacred ritual in someone’s culture that you clearly don’t understand... everything bad about this.” (26:12)
• Ben: "Appropriating someone in death for your own death, that knocks it to a 10 to me, the hubris alone." (25:57)
• Jack: “He actually made it into the encyclopedia of mummies—which, to me, feels like a little bit of a backdoor entry to getting into college.” (25:36)
• Noel: “Despite being kind of depressed, I'm also really happy we got to do this. Maybe we can make this a regular thing!” (33:49)

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Final Thoughts & Farewell

(33:49 – 35:44)

• Ben, Noel, Jack, and Miles wrap up by highlighting the intersection of humor and history’s uncomfortable truths.
• Jack and Miles invite listeners to check out The Daily Zeitgeist, while Ben and Noel propose that audience-submitted historical flexes could fuel future episodes.

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Episode Highlights & Takeaways

• Sugar sculptures (“subtleties”) were an outrageous, satirical display of wealth and privilege rooted in the exploitation of enslaved people.
• Kara Walker’s 2014 “A Subtlety” art installation recontextualizes this, spotlighting sugar’s violent legacy.
• Victorian England’s public mummy unwrappings—complete with “Caucasian-justifying” pseudoscience and literal grave-robbing—stand as perhaps history’s most macabre social status flex.
• The crew muses that modern society’s flexes (from luxury cakes to rare collectibles) aren’t far from their historical predecessors—though hopefully, with fewer layers of brutality.
• The episode blends levity with frank reckoning over the cruelty and absurdity embedded in the history of showing off.

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Transcript

[Ben]

Fellow ridiculous historians, we are returning with a dope beat for you to step to step two. Step two.

[Noel]

Step two. Yeah, for sure.

[Ben]

We are returning with part two of History's Weirdest Flexes. And guys, we had such a great time on this one with our pals Jack and Miles from the Daily Zeitgeist.

[Noel]

You're certainly familiar with the phrase weird flex, but okay. And we go deep down the historical rabbit hole of weird flexes. You enjoyed part one, now dive right on into part two.

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[Ben]

Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. And we're back. Thanks for tuning in. Welcome to part two of Weird Historical Flexes. Or as we have come to find, perhaps cruel historical flexes. I'm Ben.

[Noel]

I am Noel.

[Ben]

And that's our super producer, Casey Pegram, who to our knowledge has never eaten 20 tortoises. We are not venturing into this alone, listeners. You recall from our previous episode, we had two of our favorite fellow podcasters on and they decided to be kind enough to return for the second part of this show. Let's welcome the Daily Zeitgeist, Miles and Jack back on the air.

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[Noel]

Hey.

[Jack]

Whoa. Thanks for having us.

[Noel]

Truth be told, they didn't really return so much as just stayed in the same place and we, you know, the, the. Through the magic of podcast, we didn't

[Miles]

have to go for a whole week. I'm so thirsty.

[Jack]

Yeah, we just sat in our seats on pause.

[Noel]

Doesn't. Doesn't Robert Evans have some like Mountain Dew that you guys could Doritos could have?

[Ben]

Yeah.

[Jack]

Oh no. If we touch his Mountain Dew, we are in like, we will actually be in harm's way.

[Ben]

Okay.

[Jack]

Sometimes don't touch. We don't touch Evans's do. Yeah.

[Ben]

Sometimes he sends me Evans out of context text about that and he's like, don't touch my Mountain Dew. And I didn't know, I didn't know the number at first. So I was very confused.

[Jack]

No. One time I was driving with him and we saw a person at a bus stop drinking a Mountain Dew and he, he's like, roll down your window. Roll down your window. And he stuck his head on goes, that's mine. And the person was so confused and took it from him and drove off. So that's what we're talking about when we talk to talk about Robert Evans. What do you call that? His do privilege.

[Miles]

Do.

[Jack]

Yeah.

[Miles]

Do mania.

[Jack]

Do mania. Whatever you want to call it. He.

[Miles]

Yeah. Whenever you're driving him somewhere, he never tells you when to stop, he just rolls out of the car. Yeah, that's very.

[Noel]

And like that, he's gone.

[Jack]

It's crazy.

[Noel]

It's funny that we're talking about over

[Miles]

and there's a open, flapping door that's.

[Noel]

That's really dangerous for you and very disrespectful to your vehicle. Dangerous for the vehicle. Robert is an interesting character, but speaking of sugary beverages, I'm going to do a sugary, weird flex, okay? So when Ben first hipped me to this, it was described in the article that I read in a list on io9 as displays of opulence in the UK during the 1700s. Being piles of sugar just laying around

[Ben]

the house, like Tony Montagna style. Like Tony.

[Noel]

Like Scarface style. Just like, say, hey, check out my sugar. This is how much money I have. Because I'm showing you, because I have piles of sugar all over the house. And we think of that in terms of today, that just means you're keeping a very messy kitchen. But this was on display. But as it turns out, it wasn't just piles of sugar, or it may have been at first, but it actually evolved into these really ostentatious sugar sculptures.

[Ben]

Sweet.

[Jack]

Get it?

[Noel]

I do, Ben. I do get it. And I said 1700s, and I actually meant 1600s. But what's a hundred? You know, what's that between friends?

[Ben]

Drops in the bucket, man. Grains of sugar.

[Noel]

Drops in the bucket. So here's the thing. Decorative sugar was achieved by using things like gum, and then it was mixed into this kind of paste that you could sculpt into these figures. And whether they were large sculptures that would be on display constantly, or whether they were these kind of small, little hardened, sugary baked confections that could then be eaten. And the most bizarre part of this to me is the fact that they were called subtleties. And they're not subtle at all, right? A flex isn't meant to be subtle. A flex is a flex because it's in your face. And, like, check out this weird thing that I'm doing. Remark upon my wealth. But they were called subtleties. And the smaller forms of them that were these little creatures would be formed into things like buildings or animals, and they were meant to be admired before they were eaten.

[Ben]

So they were eaten.

[Noel]

They were eaten. But here's the thing. It was all in the king class, the nobles, knights, and clergy, and you had to have a whole lot of expendable sugar to make these things to be able to spare enough to actually kind of like, sacrifice Them for these kind of weird little flexes or giant flexes, the case might be. And it was kind of this display of craftsmanship and also culinary skills. But a lot of them actually were satirical symbols or they had messages that were conveyed to the guests. And Henry V, when he received his coronation ceremony, he did that very thing. They were symbols that kind of confirmed his privilege as the. Basically a godlike power as the king, and also knights rights. And it also highlighted the. This. This whole concept that you could. It was almost this nihilistic idea that you could take something that was artisanally created and that was meant to be beautiful, and you could remark on it and then, you know, admire it, then devour it, as very similar to your turtle story, Jack, where it's like, okay, we're going to, like, note, you know, Darwin's going to make notes about how rare and beautiful these creatures are and how we should, you know, take care of them. And then I'm going to eat it just to show that I am the master of my own destiny and that no one is above me. So that is totally what happened here. And then here's the thing. Over time, it became less of a completely upper class thing because sugar became less expensive. And it was something that, you know, lower class people could afford, too. But. Have you guys ever heard of the artist Kara Walker?

[Ben]

Yes, actually. But I'm the worst person to ask.

[Noel]

You are the worst person now. You're the best person to ask me. So Kara Walker is a New York City artist who does. You may have seen some of her work.

[Jack]

They are silhouette stuff.

[Noel]

Silhouette stuff, Exactly. And they're depicting antebellum culture and just the brutality of rac. They're simultaneously kind of grotesque and they're beautiful. And they're also kind of darkly comic where there are these kind of shadow figures in profile doing all these various things that would have happened during those times. She did an art installation in New York City, in Brooklyn, actually, at the former site of the Domino Sugar factory. And it was called a subtlety. And it was a giant sphinx that was 35ft tall and was created with just tons of this sugar paste and was molded into a massive sphinx like sculpture with the face akin to kind of the really, really stereotypical image of, like, Aunt Jemima or, like, the mammy kind of trope.

[Ben]

Yeah, the racist trope.

[Noel]

Yes, utterly racist. And with kind of like a bandana on. And then throughout the factory are all of these kind of, like, hidden messages talking about how black people were sort of commodified to cut cane and to participate in the sugar trade and all of that. So it's sort of taking this, like, old, kind of forgotten, weird flex. The subtleties, which, again, since sugar was so rare, it was saying, like, hey, I've got so much money that I can take my expensive sugar and make it into these, like, frivolous things that are then devoured by my guests.

[Ben]

And this was 2014. When she did this.

[Noel]

This was 2014 exactly. And I think it's not there anymore, but it attracted about 4,000 viewers when it first went on display. And it was a very popular exhibition for quite some time. But. Yeah. What do you guys think about that? There's a lot to unpack there.

[Jack]

Yeah, just piles of sugar just make me nervous. As someone who grew up in California, where ants appear out of nowhere, and I was always raised to, like, even rinse out cans or juice boxes because ant would show up. And I was. Caused a lot of anxiety. But also. But also hearing about the Kara Walker piece is good too, you know, because reminding people that, yes, you may have these opulent displays in your homes, but at what cost? Who are the people whose blood was spilled to even get these things to your house? But yeah, I think just like, you know, piling stuff up is. I've got to say, I'm not as impressed. You know, just a pile of a thing, you know, like gold statues or like gold piles, sugar piles, sugar statues. I mean, I think we could go a little bit further than that. But, you know, it's.

[Noel]

I'll.

[Jack]

I'll rate that. I'll give it a solid five on the flex chart.

[Ben]

Out of. Out of ten.

[Jack]

Yeah, yeah, that's a five out of ten.

[Miles]

That's a five out of ten for me, dude. Yeah. Do we think that they called them, like, was this around the time that sarcasm was invented? Because the calling them subtleties is like. So that sounds like the sort of thing that would be invented when someone was like, wow, that's subtle. Yeah.

[Jack]

I think almost even naming it a subtlety, that's actually the flex.

[Ben]

That's the flex.

[Jack]

Yeah.

[Noel]

That's a really, really good point.

[Jack]

You really go, oh, that, that, that bit of subtlety there.

[Noel]

I also, I also love. I love the notion of this idea of the invention of sarcasm. I think that's just like that all of a sudden, it just, you know, poofed into existence. People were like smart asses just overnight. I think that's fantastic. But no, yeah, I completely agree. It is utterly snark to call these things subtlety. And even more leaning in to that opulent display. It's like, oh, it's no big deal. It's nothing. You know, it's just, you know, my opulence and absurd obscene wealth and terribly

[Ben]

cruel because we have to also remember to your point, Miles, especially at that time in the age of the subtleties, this was highly likely to be slave created sugar. You know what I mean? So that's. I would say that's even less of a weird flex and more of a brutal one.

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[Ben]

Now, fellow ridiculous historians, as you may know, we recently returned from a just spectacular oceanfront resort, Baja Mar, over in

[Noel]

the Bahamas in Nassau. We know what you're thinking.

[Ben]

Lucky us.

[Noel]

Must be nice. Well, it was nice. You're not wrong. This was a real special experience for all three of us. Max was there too.

[Ben]

Yeah, Baja Mar, get this. Is this just stunning oceanfront resort in Nassau, Bahamas. They've got multiple hotels. It's also, you know what I thought was really cool? It's family friendly and it's adult friendly, if that makes sense.

[Noel]

Simultaneously, we had some phenomenal dinners. My personal favorite was at Marcus. Had a incredible dry aged rib eye there and these truffle whipped potatoes that were to die for.

[Ben]

Yeah, and there are water parks. The animal experiences are awesome.

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I jumped off a false cliff.

[Ben]

So did Max. You can go to the Rosewood Hotel, the sls, and of course where we stayed, the stylishly modern Grand Hyatt. So don't delay. Plan your own [e-mail] did you know

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[Noel]

I will say this, there's something I wanted to add a little later. In the 1600s, there's actually a cookbook from a royal cook in the in the court named Robert May. And he describes even taking this to the next level where there would be, for example, a stag made of sugar, full size, that bleeds wine when an arrow is removed from it. That's like sticking in there.

[Jack]

There we go.

[Noel]

Or you've got like a castle that actually fires live artillery rounds made of sugar. Or you have something like a giant pie made of sugar that's filled with live birds that then fly out when they crack open the sugary crust.

[Ben]

So does that take it?

[Jack]

Oh, yes.

[Ben]

Does that take it up to a six or seven?

[Noel]

Can I have a point back Please, gentlemen. Thank you.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah. No, no, no. The cannon firing sugar out. That's an eight. That's an eight for sure.

[Ben]

Oh, yeah.

[Jack]

Yes.

[Miles]

Lest we start to think we're too superior to history again, guys, I did this in the last episode. I have to take it back to the two and three year old birthday parties that I frequent for just my research, personal fun on the weekends. But no, I have a three year old son.

[Jack]

You do it to dunk on your son, right? I went to so many parties this weekend. How many did you go to?

[Miles]

He's not invited. But I was at a birthday party very recently where they had a probably, you know, it was probably the size of. It was bigger than any dollhouse I've ever seen. It was a cake that was, you know, taller than two people standing on each other's shoulders that was in the shape of like a castle. Also, it was a Disney castle, obviously. And I overheard one of the moms say, oh, get my daughter out of here. I don't want her to see that cake. Because she didn't want the competition for like her daughter's birthday. I was like, oh, that's so funny.

[Jack]

Where something is such a flex that you have to shield people's eyes. Yeah, right, because it could forever ruin them.

[Noel]

Exactly.

[Jack]

I can't let them think this is normal. I can't let them think this is normal.

[Miles]

So we're still creating subtleties. They're just a giant rich kid birthday party cakes, I guess.

[Ben]

Yeah, that's the new one. That's the new subtlety. Okay, so we've got a pretty good track record of strange flexes now, but we've been building up to an especially weird flex that's gonna come from you, Miles. So everybody listening. If this was a somewhat uninteresting or lackluster show for so far then having,

[Noel]

then why are you still listening?

[Ben]

First of all, because you believe in us and you believe in Miles. And more importantly, Miles. No pressure, but literally everything is riding on you, my friend.

[Jack]

Yeah, well, I mean, when we were discussing doing this, I had a few ideas, but I wanted to really bring it into the history thing. Because recently when I was in England, I went to the history museum there and saw all the stolen history that is in there. And my first idea was like, man, the English really know how to flex on the rest of the world. Because they're like, I'll take your history and I'll keep it here and you can ask for it back, but it doesn't mean I'm giving It back. And then as I looked into it more, I was like, okay, so this, obviously it's a theme with how gigantic the British Empire was at one time. But then I found out that in Victorian England, one of the great flexes, if you were a person of means, was to. Obviously Egyptomania was. Was huge in England, especially after the Napoleonic wars and things like that. But then it turned into a thing where going to watch somebody just fully desecrate a mummy's body. Mummy unwrappings were a huge flex if you had the money to go to a live mummy unwrapping. Now what is a mummy unwrapping? Well, let me tell you, that was my question. Yes, Thomas Pettigrew, he was, you know, he was like this surgeon and, And a man of science. But then eventually the Egyptian bug, he got bit by the Egypt bug and started thinking like, man, you know, like, what's. Like what's really going on under all those wraps? And he decided, yes, here we go. This is something I can do. I can combine many things, science. I can combine people's just obsession with the. The darkness of Egypt or just the sort of otherness of Egypt and get them and sell some tickets at the same time. So he wasn't the first person to unroll a mummy in front of an audience, but he was. He was the guy who kind of mainstreamed it as being like a performance where people would buy tickets to go and just watch this thing happen live and in person.

[Noel]

Miles. And can I stop you real quick? Did he do it like, where he just like on Scooby Doo, where he just pulls the one string and then the mummy just spins out like a car with cartoon sound effect. And there's actually almost.

[Jack]

What's funny is there was someone in France who was doing something similar too, which is a little more performative than just, you know, sort of taking the bandages off. In France, there were moments where they would take a. A mummy that was going to be de mummified and put it, like, on this, you know, machine essentially, that made it look like the corpse was dancing as the bandages were just ripped off the body.

[Noel]

Yikes.

[Jack]

And people were like, y, that's cool. Making it a real kind of freaky performance. But in England, you know, England is more about, as we said, the subtleties. So there they. They took it a little more seriously, a little more dramatic by, you know, saying really, you know, just overly elaborate monologues while then, you know, cutting off all of the bandages to demonify it. When these mummy I guess D wrappings, as they call them, were happening. The man behind it, Thomas Pettigrew, had a few kind of dark aims with doing this. One of the theories that people have suggested that he was really also, like, through de. Mummifying these people, was trying to prove that ancient Egyptians were actually Caucasian and not African origin by using, like, physiognomy to, like, measure the cranium and things like that.

[Ben]

A phrenologist. Oh, great.

[Jack]

Yeah. Oh, yeah, sorry, phrenology, Right. Or just to basically be like, like, yeah, this is. This is my fake science to prove that the. This old, ancient empire was actually, in fact, a Caucasian one. Right. But again, found this way of. Everybody would come by, watch the mummy get D wrapped, and it was just like the biggest thing. And it got so big that even there's even a secondary flex to the D wrappings.

[Miles]

What?

[Jack]

There was the Duke of Hamilton at the time, in 1852, when one of his dying wishes was to have Pettigrew actually mummify him and put him in an ancient Egyptian sarcophagus. And he got his wish in 1852. So now we actually. We've gone from people just being like, let's just disrespect this ancient body, right? To now let me kick this ancient body out of the sarcophagus. Now let me appropriate mummify me and put me in the sarcophagus. And that's what happened.

[Miles]

And then he did a mummy unwrapping and scared. Everybody was like, that's me.

[Jack]

No, I'm good. I'm good. Anyway, thanks for everybody coming to my birthday.

[Ben]

Seriously. That's like Bonnaroo costume level appropriation. It's beyond Bonnaroo.

[Noel]

I think Coachella.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah.

[Ben]

Oh, wait, Coachella. That's the one.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah, yeah. He be like. I mean, he acquired a. Like an actual legitimate ancient sarcophagus and of like, a princess who wasn't named but was like, that's. That will be my final vessel to rest in.

[Noel]

I say more power to him. Go ahead and mummify yourself. That's sort of like a. Like a different version of, like, go f yourself.

[Ben]

Yeah, but get your own vehicle.

[Noel]

Absolutely. You make. Build your own sarcophagi guy.

[Jack]

Just do it. Oh, yeah. And yeah, what's so funny is, like, he's actually. Because he's mummified in a sarcophagus, he actually made it into the encyclopedia of mummies.

[iHeartRadio Announcer]

Oh, wow.

[Jack]

Yeah. Which to me feels like a little bit of a, you know, sort of backdoor entry to getting into college. Reminds me of Operation Varsity Blues a little bit. Like, did you earn it really? Or any person of means who. Who is able to buy their own sarcophagus and then flex on people like that.

[Miles]

People are always trying to buy their way into the encyclopedia.

[Jack]

Mummies. Yeah, exactly. I mean it was a big problem, especially in the 80s.

[Ben]

I'm going to give that one. At first I was like, man, this is clearly 8 or a 9. But making appropriating someone in death for your own death, that knocks it to a 10 to me, the hubris alone,

[Noel]

not to mention that it is. Tickets are being sold. It's taking. It's completely commodifying and appropriating some a very sacred ritual in someone's culture that you clearly do not understand or care to understand. You're just using it for the amusement of the public. And so then you're also playing into stereotypes. Everything bad about this. So I think we should have two scales. I think we should have the weird flex scale and the cruelty scale.

[Ben]

We have been going back and forth.

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[Ben]

Now, fellow ridiculous historians, as you may know, we recently returned from a just spectacular oceanfront resort, Baja Mar, over in

[Noel]

the Bahamas in Nassau. We Know what you're thinking.

[Ben]

Lucky us.

[Noel]

Must be nice. Well, it was nice. You're not wrong. This was a real special experience for all three of us. Max was there too.

[Ben]

Yeah. Baja Mar. Get this. Is this just stunning Oceanfront resort in Nassau, Bahamas. They've got multiple hotels. It's also, you know what I thought was really cool? It's family friendly and it's adult friendly, if that makes sense.

[Noel]

Simultaneously, we had some phenomenal dinners. My personal favorite was at Marcus. Had an incredible dry aged ribeye there and these truffle whipped potatoes that were to die for.

[Ben]

Yeah, and there are water parks. The animal experiences are awesome.

[Noel]

I jumped off a false cliff.

[Ben]

So did Max. You can go to the Rosewood Hotel, the sls, and of course where we stayed, the stylishly modern Grand Hyatt. So don't delay. Plan your own [e-mail].

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[Ben]

well, I will say on the upside, one good thing about this horrifically tragic story is that in comparison, it makes the four of us look pretty good. Because we haven't done that. It's true yet.

[Jack]

Oh yeah. No, nothing but I mean, I'm not gonna lie, I'm. Every night when I envision my future, it's having so much wealth that I could Also, buy a mummy and just unwrap it.

[Amazon Health AI Announcer]

Right.

[Jack]

I'm gonna be honest.

[Miles]

I was gonna say, okay, so, yes, this is what we had instead of horror. Mov. But also, this is something I could totally see working as a flex in the modern world. Like, if I was at a party and someone was doing that, I'd be like, that makes sense. And I'm impressed. If they were, like, defiling a historic object, it's like, I don't know. It's still. It's still just wildly insane enough.

[Jack]

It's weird.

[Miles]

We also have unboxing videos.

[Jack]

Yeah,

[iHeartRadio Announcer]

yeah.

[Jack]

But I guess back then, right, they didn't have the same sort of values. Were like, we should actually preserve history. Like, oh, y' all got to see what I just stole from Egypt. Real quick. Let's watch me unwrap this mummy. Whereas now it would be like, because you're just merely destroying something of such value. It's like. It's like, look at this vase from the Ming dynasty.

[Ben]

Yeah.

[Jack]

I'm about to just toss off the freeway off ramp.

[Miles]

Right?

[Jack]

That would be pretty cool.

[Miles]

I could see it at a, like, Hollywood party of some, like, CA agent or something like that. Somebody who's cartoonishly a terrible person.

[Jack]

I'm pretty sure, like, when they wanted to open. Opened that mummy, that sarcophagus, like, last year, and people were like, what's the mummy? What's the water in that sarcophagus? And people are like, I want to drink the mummy water.

[Miles]

Yeah, mummy water.

[Ben]

I remember that.

[Noel]

I'm pretty sure Nick Cage had a mummy at one point, so that's probably available, because I think he. I think there's, like, a serious Nick Cage garage sale going on.

[Ben]

He had a T. Rex skull.

[Noel]

He had a T. Rex, so surely he had a mummy as well. I'm just conjecturing here, but I'd like to believe that he did.

[Ben]

Snapchat money.

[Noel]

He's a. He's a. He's an odd character. Geez, guys, this was a lot less fun than I thought it was going to be. And that is not on you. That is just on history itself.

[Jack]

Because history. Yeah, I had a good time. I mean, yeah, yeah, no, no, I

[Noel]

had a great time. I had a great time. But these stories were. Most of them were kind of bummers. I would say the. The least bummery one was Ben's decorative hobo story. And even that was pretty twisted.

[Ben]

Ornamental Hermit.

[Noel]

I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Decorative hobo versus Ornamental Hermit.

[Ben]

You can't try to, like, like, appropriate. What happened?

[Noel]

Hey, don't you accuse your own phrase of appropriation, sir. I would never. I would never.

[Jack]

It all depends on what your flavor is of flex. I mean, Jack's was about animal cruelty.

[Miles]

Yeah. Flexing on the animals.

[Jack]

Yeah. Subtleties was about slavery. Y. The mine was about colonialism, empire, and the desecration of people's cultures.

[Miles]

Yeah.

[Ben]

Yeah.

[Jack]

And then the other one was about taking advantage of the destiny.

[Miles]

That's right. Your bum, son.

[Noel]

Yeah.

[Jack]

And I guess now. I guess nowadays the flexes are better because now we're just saying, like. Yeah, I actually, like, I went to high school with Chris Rock's kid and I beat him in basketball, so there's that. All right, but.

[Ben]

Okay, I'm gonna tell people that's a true story about you now. Are you cool with that? Just back me up if it comes up in conversation.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah. It's one of the many lies I do, so don't worry.

[iHeartRadio Announcer]

Yeah.

[Noel]

Well, despite. Despite being kind of depressed, I'm also really happy we got to do this. And I did, all things considered, have a really good time having you guys on this show. And maybe we can make this a regular thing. I think there's obviously way more historical, weird flexes that we can dig into and do this again. Thank you guys so much for coming on.

[Jack]

I'm going to do some. I got more in my back pocket right now.

[Ben]

Let's do it. Yeah. I'm going to actually take it a step further, and I'm going to try to make some new weird, historical flexes for the future that will hopefully not be as. As terrible as these four turned out to be. But, guys, I know everybody listening is saying, well, we enjoyed the hell out of hanging out with Jack and Miles. Where can they find you before you come back on this show?

[Miles]

You guys can find us at the Daily Zeitgeist. It's a podcast that we do, as the name would suggest, daily, every weekday, Monday through Friday. It's an hour rundown of. Of just everything that's happened in the Zeitgeist. Pop culture news. Those are kind of the two big ones.

[Jack]

Politics, politics, politics.

[Miles]

You know, all of. All of it. Yeah. And you can find me on Twitter @jackobrian.

[Jack]

Oh, you can find me on Twitter and Instagram. Ylesofgray G R A Y.

[Ben]

And I wanna give you guys a shout out, too, to make sure that all our listeners know this. You heard correct, folks. That's a daily podcast. Casey, Noel, and I do this about two times a week. So I I am beyond impressed that you guys not only did your regular show but also came here to do a show with us. So thank you. That's amazing.

[Jack]

Our pleasure.

[Miles]

We're big fans. We're thrilled to do it.

[Jack]

Yeah. And it's, you know, our show isn't as thorough as yours is. Again, we like to consider our show a second rate podcast.

[Miles]

Second rate podcast.

[Jack]

Just do it a lot, that's all.

[Ben]

So check out the guys on Instagram and Twitter if you want a closer look at the second best garden gnome collection in East Los Angeles. That's a good callback if you listen to both episodes, which you should. In the meantime, we're calling it a day. We wanna give a very late thanks and shout out to our super producer, Casey Pegram. Woo hoo.

[Noel]

We'd like to thank Alex Williams who composed our theme, Gabe Luzier who helps us out with research and I'm just Ms. Christopher. I'm going to give him another shout out. Christopher Oiotes. Jonathan Strickland, the Quizzter, you Ben, I'd like to thank you for being a friend and a confidant and all the things that are in the Golden Girls theme song.

[Ben]

And of course, thanks again to Miles and Jack. Thanks to everyone for checking this out. Hey, you know what, folks? Tell us about your favorite weird historical flexes or even just very, very petty things committed by historical people of note.

[Noel]

And who knows, maybe this will be a running thing and we can include some of them in a future episode. Until then, we'll see you next time. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

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What's up cousin?

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